soph (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
sophia_sol) wrote2020-06-06 01:30 pm
sophia_sol) wrote2020-06-06 01:30 pm
The Proposal, by Jasmine Guillory
Really enjoyed this one!
Nik's mediocre boyfriend of only 5 months proposes to her on the jumbotron at a sports game, making her have to do her rejecting of him in public. Carlos and his sister are nearby and feel sorry for her, and help her make her escape from all the attention! Carlos and Nik hit it off and begin what they agree is very definitely only a casual relationship, because neither is interested in anything more serious. Obviously.
I love me a romance novel with interesting friendships and/or family relationships for the leads, so we don't see them in a vacuum, and this book was good for that. I particularly liked Nik's friends!
I liked seeing how much enjoyment Nik and Carlos get from spending time with each other too - this isn't one of the romance novels where I'm in it for all the background platonic relationships and/or plot but don't care about the main relationship. I liked the romance a lot!
I appreciated that Carlos's arc involved learning how to take a step back and give more space for the women in his life to do things for themselves without his input or assistance, but I feel like his revelation was a bit late in coming, I would have preferred to see more of him actively working on that. It's such an ingrained pattern for him that it's going to take him a lot of very conscious effort to integrate the lessons learned. And the push-back came almost entirely from his family, not from Nik, other than the few protests from her at the very beginning of their acquaintance. Did she decide she was fine with this kind of behaviour from him? Did she just not want to make a fuss? Did she stop noticing he did that kind of thing? I would have liked to see her reaction to his character growth, since it's relevant for her too.
But that's just one minor detraction from what was overall a very enjoyable book. I'd heard great things about Guillory and that this was the one to begin with for her, and indeed it was lots of fun. I'll be reading more of Guillory in the future, I think.
Nik's mediocre boyfriend of only 5 months proposes to her on the jumbotron at a sports game, making her have to do her rejecting of him in public. Carlos and his sister are nearby and feel sorry for her, and help her make her escape from all the attention! Carlos and Nik hit it off and begin what they agree is very definitely only a casual relationship, because neither is interested in anything more serious. Obviously.
I love me a romance novel with interesting friendships and/or family relationships for the leads, so we don't see them in a vacuum, and this book was good for that. I particularly liked Nik's friends!
I liked seeing how much enjoyment Nik and Carlos get from spending time with each other too - this isn't one of the romance novels where I'm in it for all the background platonic relationships and/or plot but don't care about the main relationship. I liked the romance a lot!
I appreciated that Carlos's arc involved learning how to take a step back and give more space for the women in his life to do things for themselves without his input or assistance, but I feel like his revelation was a bit late in coming, I would have preferred to see more of him actively working on that. It's such an ingrained pattern for him that it's going to take him a lot of very conscious effort to integrate the lessons learned. And the push-back came almost entirely from his family, not from Nik, other than the few protests from her at the very beginning of their acquaintance. Did she decide she was fine with this kind of behaviour from him? Did she just not want to make a fuss? Did she stop noticing he did that kind of thing? I would have liked to see her reaction to his character growth, since it's relevant for her too.
But that's just one minor detraction from what was overall a very enjoyable book. I'd heard great things about Guillory and that this was the one to begin with for her, and indeed it was lots of fun. I'll be reading more of Guillory in the future, I think.